The Saints Row Review | technological radar

Exam Information

Playing time: 18 hours

Platform: PC

Saints Row is an identity crisis distilled into software. While the playful charm of Volition’s third-person mayhem sims is still alive and well in places, the 2022 iteration of the fan-favorite series struggles to figure out exactly what it’s supposed to be. If you think you can perform the necessary mental gymnastics, though, you might be able to get a lot out of a visit to Las Vegas. Sorry – Saints Unscathed.

For those new here, Saints Row is an open-world third-person shooter and GTA game where you play as an aspiring gang leader who is tired of being misunderstood in his role as a nine-to-five tenant-cop. The game attempts to marry crazy, over-the-top criminal antics with a story based on struggling Zellennials.

It’s been seven years since the last installment in the series, and a lot has changed since then. The gig economy has become more endemic, we’re in the middle of a pandemic, and politics has somehow become even more caustic and vicious. Saints Row attempts to drag the capricious and chaotic formula of its predecessors into this new decade.

And this attempt to have your cake and eat it too really reveals Saints Row’s limitations. Sometimes, the more serious moments of the narrative add a nice layer of spice to the adventure, rooting the Saints’ antics in a relatable world. But this contrast often creates as much dissonance as it intrigues.

• Saints Row 2022 (XBox Series X) at Best Buy for €59.99 (opens in a new tab)

Saints Row price and release date

• What is it? An open-world third-person shooter where you play as an up-and-coming gang leader
• Release Date: August 23, 2022
• Price: € 59.99 / € 54.99 / AU € 99.95
• What can I play? PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, and PC via the Epic Games Store.

angel with a shotgun

(Image credit: future)

You spend most of your time in Saints Row shooting someone. You show up, commit a crime, and then shoot some people out of necessity. This is the basic gameplay loop. At its best, it's glorious. At its worst, it's tedious and overworked. What you get out of Saints Row will largely depend on your appreciation of this process.

The basic assault rifle looks like a fire hose crossed with your little brother's fully automatic electric Nerf gun.

Don’t come to Saints Row expecting a precision, hand-crafted shooting experience. It’s not Battlefield 2042 or Arma. Thankfully, Saints Row doesn’t care that it’s not Battlefield. It revels in that fact. The basic assault rifle looks like a fire hose crossed with your little brother’s fully-automatic electric Nerf gun. It’s like aiming a harpoon gun while trapped inside a giant vat of molasses. It’s a gameplay-enhancing feature.

In fact, combat in Saints Row isn't a carefully curated military contest. It's more of an exercise in showboating. Despite the title's more grounded claims, all of your actions in combat amount to gloating. Fight long enough and your takedown meter fills up. Approach an unlucky enemy fighter, press the right button, and your boss will deftly execute an unlimited takedown worthy of the juiciest WWE action movies or the most explosive WWE cage fights. are luxurious.

To add icing to the Layer Cake, we have the new Flow system, a welcome addition to Saints Row’s combat experience. As you progress through the game, you’ll unlock abilities that you can use during combat to destructive effect. These range from the mundane, like grenades and smoke bombs, to animated punches and vampiric, health-stealing buffs. These additional tools in your arsenal can be activated by spending Flow Points, which you acquire by dealing damage or killing lives. While they don’t drastically change the status quo of the third-person shooter, they do add another avenue through which Saints Row’s more over-the-top elements could manifest.

The trifecta of over-the-top abilities, takedowns, and shooting makes you feel at least a little bit superhuman. It rarely feels like a fair fight. In fact, mowing down hordes of enemies in Saints Row often feels gratuitous. It’s basically a ridiculous power fantasy. I love it.

(Image credit: Deep Silver)

Unfortunately, Volition's latest doesn't always remember this crucial aspect of Saints Row's appeal. This neglect is nowhere more clearly demonstrated than in the opening mission.

Here, our hero spends his first day with Marshall, an extremely morally questionable private military group. In contrast to the much happier atmosphere that permeates much of the rest of the title, the opening cutscene comes across as an almost parodic take on the worst aspects of forgettable, soul-crushing FPS games from the late 2000s. It plays out straight and doesn’t veer into the parody it seems to crave. It’s odd that Volition refrains from stepping on the gas during this first segment.

This is in stark contrast to the later missions, most of which are simple but enjoyable romps through the city of Santo Ileso. One mission in particular, an homage to Fortnite and Elden Ring, locks the player on a creepy island and requires them to collect weapons that fall from the sky. Victory is only assured when you’re the last person standing. It’s hard to believe that the tutorial mission and this melodramatic pastiche of Battle Royale end up in the same game. It’s in this duality that we see the fundamental struggle in almost every aspect of Saints Row play out.

Saints and sinners

(Image credit: future)

Still, there's a cocky charm at the heart of Saints Row that no amount of indecision can fully undo. In its best moments, the dialogue shines.

During the early stages of the game, you and your cohort of downtrodden Zellenial friends, Eli, Neenah, and Kevin, attempt to break economic stagnation with the judicious application of gratuitous crime. More often than not, these characters are a lot of fun. They offer lively, well-polished banter. Unfortunately, they're not free from the awkward tonal ambiguity that plagues the game, and in the more personal missions with each character, whiplash abounds.

Tragically, Saints Row often seems ashamed of itself.

Tragically, Saints Row often feels ashamed of itself. Though the game flirts with a refreshingly skeptical line about the excesses of capitalism, it rarely commits to a political statement for long. The main characters, all struggling gig economy workers, will often offer exactly the kind of one-liners and biting critiques that fit their circumstances. The next moment, though, they’ll be mocking the idealism of others who share their skepticism. The lack of consistency is sometimes baffling. Why should a cast of characters who can steal cars and raid pawn shops on a whim feel tied to such mundane concerns as “rent” and “job security”?

(Image credit: future)

In one mission, you help a character take revenge for the destruction of his car, a gift from his beloved, terminally ill mother. Their face-to-face over a delicate and painful family situation is immediately followed by a helicopter battle. On their own, these two elements are compelling, albeit in profoundly different ways. Together they form a strange cocktail.

At its most serious moments, Saints Row asks you to pretend you're not a superhuman killing machine in a world filled with hapless NPCs. While this attempt at sleight of hand is sometimes successful, the game never quite escapes the tension it exerts on the main story.

be your own boss

(Image credit: future)

Saints Row wants to remind you that you are the figurehead of an up-and-coming street gang.

As well as playing a major role in your friends’ lives, you’ll also find yourself steering the gang’s financial prospects through the Venture system. This system allows you to build shady businesses and revenue streams across the city. Each venture then offers a series of side quests that improve the financial performance of the venture and the passive income of the Saints as a whole. These Vice City-style side hustles don’t disappoint. From insurance scams to a full-blown LARP fortress, each criminal enterprise has an endearing character.

When it comes to the Boss himself, Saints Row doesn’t skimp on other opportunities for character building – literally. The character creator is sumptuous in its offering, bordering on gratuitous. By removing the gender slider of previous titles, the Boss Factory allows you to individually customize every facet of your physical appearance and gender presentation, allowing you to portray a fuller spectrum of human beings. The game also provides a degree of representation for those with disabilities. For example, you can create a Boss with prosthetics. It’s refreshing to see, and emblematic of Saints Row’s ever-present generosity.

Most vehicles are also fully customizable, allowing you to mix and match paint jobs, extra equipment, and even hood ornaments if you so desire. There’s a wide range of different attractions on offer as you make your way through Saints Row’s bustling open world. Muscle cars, convertibles, and even jet-powered motorcycles are all readily available to those who seek them out. Fans of the series will be pleased to know that the radio is back, too, allowing you to roll down the road accompanied by anything from Bach to KRS-One. Fans of custom open-world experiences likely won’t be disappointed.

is not no rest for the wicked

(Image credit: future)

Saints Row is ultimately an ambitious but flawed title. The game dips its toes into two contrasting tones, sometimes to its advantage, but often to its detriment. However, when it decides to tap into the unabashed melodrama of its predecessors at the expense of a grittier GTA 5-adjacent experience, it shines.

Some aspects of Saints Row will have to stand the test of time before they can be rated. Bugs are infrequent but present, and while none have broken the game yet, some have required the occasional mission restart. While it seems likely that Volition will address them in time, I’d be lying if I said they didn’t impact the gameplay experience. On the other hand, the co-op campaign system, while promising, will require stress testing before anyone could speak to its robustness or friendliness.

If you play Saints Row, I guarantee that something will make you laugh. It might be a joke from one of the central players who gets you. Or maybe you revel in the childish glee that only comes from hitting a car full of cops with a dump truck. Though it sometimes seems ashamed of its own excesses, Volition contains enough to amuse even the most stoic of us. You’ll have to decide for yourself whether it’s worth wearing a neck brace after all the tonal enhancement.

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